Yangcheon Mok4-dong and Gwanak Seonghyeon-dong with Many Old Houses Also Selected as 'Moatown'

Seoul City announced on the 28th that it held the 'Moatown Site Selection Committee' the previous day and additionally selected Mok 4-dong in Yangcheon-gu and Seonghyeon-dong in Gwanak-gu. This is the first case to pass the review since the Moatown site selection method was switched to an open call system from February this year.

Moatown is a small-scale redevelopment project by Seoul City that promotes maintenance projects by combining old low-rise residential areas within 100,000㎡ where large-scale redevelopment is difficult. Once designated as a Moatown, various regulatory relaxation benefits can be received, such as easing of project requirements, relaxation of aging and elapsed years criteria, upgrading of land use zones, and designation as a special architectural district.

The open call system works by residents selecting three planned project sites in an area of at least 30,000㎡, obtaining 30% resident consent, and requesting the autonomous district. The district reviews the application requirements, holds a resident briefing session, and then applies to Seoul City for the open call.

In this review, the selection committee composed of city council members and external experts examined ▲ whether there is damage due to dense semi-basement housing or frequent flooding ▲ the necessity of maintenance such as building aging ▲ feasibility of Moahouse (small-scale housing maintenance project) realization ▲ concerns about resident conflicts or speculation such as new construction ▲ and the rationality of promoting small-scale housing maintenance projects considering other local conditions.

The two selected sites share common characteristics of densely packed old houses, poor infrastructure, long-term inconvenience experienced by local residents, and semi-basement houses accounting for about 60% or more.

The area around 724-1 Mok 4-dong, Yangcheon-gu (52,758㎡) is densely populated with multi-family and detached houses with an overall aging rate of about 67% or more, and has poor parking conditions and infrastructure. In particular, semi-basement houses account for about 61%, making it an area urgently requiring overall maintenance.

The area around 1021 Seonghyeon-dong, Gwanak-gu (81,623㎡) is also a hilly area densely packed with old houses with an overall aging rate of about 65%, and like Mok 4-dong, suffers from severe parking shortages and very poor infrastructure.

After each autonomous district establishes a management plan for the selected sites, conducts public inspection by residents, and passes committee review, the sites will be designated as 'Small-scale Housing Maintenance Management Areas' with legal effect as Moatown, and the projects will proceed in earnest.

The city supports 70% of the cost (380 million KRW per site) required to establish the management plan for Moatown designation. The support funds will be granted to the autonomous districts in the second half of this year, and once the management plans are established, Moatown designations are expected to proceed sequentially from the second half of next year.

In addition, to block speculative demand such as share splitting, the city plans to designate and announce July 6 as the management calculation reference date for the two selected sites.

The city explained that as a result of switching the Moatown selection method to an open call system, the period from application to selection has been drastically shortened from about three months to about one month. Including the two sites selected this time, as of June, 12 autonomous districts have requested open calls with resident consent for a total of 19 sites.

Since the first open call for Moatown sites in February last year, among the 65 sites selected so far, five sites with established management plans have completed designation through approval and announcement. Twenty-five project sites are in the process of establishing associations and preparation procedures for housing project implementation.

The city plans to promptly carry out procedures for areas at the management plan establishment stage and use a pre-designation method to additionally designate a total of 37 sites as Moatown within this year, accelerating project progress.

According to the city, since the announcement of the Moahouse and Moatown policies in January last year, the number of street housing maintenance project sites in Seoul has increased by more than 50%.

The number of approvals for association establishment for street housing maintenance projects increased by about 41%, from 42 cases in 2021 to 59 cases in 2022, and the number of sequential consent forms issued for association establishment also increased by more than 50%, from 169 cases to 254 cases during the same period.

As of June, there are a total of 193 Moahouse sites within Moatown in Seoul, comprising about 36,000 households.

Han Byung-yong, Director of Seoul City's Housing Policy Office, said, "We will steadily promote the Moahouse and Moatown policies, which have high public response and expectations, to promptly renovate poor low-rise residential areas."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.